Suggestions for 5-6 year old

[fromheretothemoon]

DS will be turning 6 in a few months and loves being read to at bedtime (but is a very reluctant reader himself). He is definitely now preferring books that are longer but still have pictures in them.

Can anyone recommend some longer story books that have pictures please? He won’t listen to any books like The Magic Faraway Tree or Charlie & the Chocolate Factory because they don’t have pictures. He likes a whole range of stories so any suggestions welcome.

Adventures of Mr Penguin. They are illustrated chapter books rather than picture books.

Is your local library open? Or a big bookshop. There is a massive range of books aimed at this age group... Short chapters, lots of pictures. My DDs favourite series were Hubble Bubble, Jolley Rodgers, Hotel Flamingo, Fabio the Flamingo Detective, Claude... (And a lot more I can't remember!)

Mr Penguin are great, as are: the Rabbit and Bear books (Julian Gough and Jim Field), Nick Sharatt’s Cat and the King books and anything by Philip Reeve and Sarah McIntyre.
Also the Bee Boy books.
There’s so much lovely stuff for that age.

We have exactly the same issue. Things I've found so far that have worked are:

• Colour short story versions of the Faraway Tree, I got a set of 8 ish for £15 on Amazon, they are a bit pricey individually. They are episodes of maybe 3-4 chapters from the Faraway tree and sequels, with colour illustrations on every page.
• The longer Winnie the Witch books by Laura Owen, DS aged 5.5 loves them (they aren't at all 'girlie'), they have black and white illustrations every double page at least. Again, you can get a box set of them pretty cheaply on eBay. He
• We were recommended Mud puddle Farm by Michael Morpugo, it has black and white pictures every double page but while DS happily listened to me read it once he didn't like it enough to ask for a re-read.
• The Iron Man by Ted Hughes, the version illustrated by Chris Mould was a huge hit. It has beautiful colour illustrations which DS loved.

If black and white pictures every few pages are Ok, Oliver Moon and Mrs Pepperpot have also been hits. It has even less pictures, but Clever Polly and the Stupid Wolf has been a big hit too - the stories are quite short and each chapter is a separate story often linked to a fairy tale so they seem to cope without the pictures. We've also had the first Magic Treehouse book out the library which has gone down well - again it's pictures every few pages but as it's about dinosaurs and reasonably short which I think helped a lot.

I'm still looking for ideas so interested to see what others recommend!

DS1 who is 6 had just finished The Boy Who Grew Dragons' series by Andy Shepard. There's a few of the (Grew, Flew with... and another one or two) so check out which one comes first. He's really enjoyed them. They do seem to start easy, and get harder as the series goes on, so watch out for that.

Flying Fergus series
The Flat Stanley collection
Dave Pigeon
The Adventures of Harry Stephenson
Hotel Flamingo
Claude series
The Hundred Mile An Hour Dog
Dirty Bertie

This excellent book got my 5yr old DS reading: Ready Steady Race by Smriti Prasadam-Halls. It's pretty fun to read too!

I've also seen excellent reviews on Amazon for 'I Can Read DC Phonics' (Batman, Superman etc).

How to Train you Dragon has little black and white illustrations (and silly names, interesting characters and good plots) if that helps.

My 6yo has recently enjoyed the Sam Wu books (Sam Wu is Not Afraid of the Dark, etc) and The Dragon in the Library by Louie Stowell.

A lot of the Roald Dahl books come in colour editions which are wonderfully illustrated. My daughter who sounds similar to your son (reluctant reader, very visual so loves the pictures) absolutely loves them.

The storey tree house books are a favourite here!

We've had success with

• Billy and the mini monsters
• Wigglesbottom primary
• Jolliet-Rodgers series by Jonny Duddle
• Claude
• Magic Tree House series
• Captain Underpants
• Colour Editions of the Roald Dahl books (mainly the shorter ones such as the Enormous crocodile, the giraffe the pelly and me and George's marvellous medicine)

I've read a preview and reviews of a new book by Justin Davis,The Snark...its been likened to The Gruffalo! So.e humour and good underlying theme, lovely illustrations too!